Step by step

Eight tips on how to keep the continuity culture

Keeping business units engaged in business continuity takes some work, according to John Robinson, director of JR Consulting Partners, a business-continuity consulting firm.

He suggests these eight steps:

1. Allow the business to influence IT recovery timeframes by completing a quantitative business-impact analysis.

2. Identify an IT-literate business continuity champion and empower that person as an internal auditor.

3. Generate public relations internally whenever a continuity event occurs.

4. Set up intranet pages and update them regularly with continuity information and material.

5. Allow the business to be wrong. Business heads believe their area is “critical.”

6. Eliminate IT-speak outside of the IT department. Concentrate on prioritizing the services that IT provides, not how it provides them.

7. Make participation an enjoyable, instructive and rewarding experience. Highlight success so people want to be associated with continuity.

8. Make continuity considerations an integrated part of every new project, both inside and outside of IT.